The primary objective of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is to stabilize greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations while ensuring food security and sustainable development.

While the UNFCCC does not spell out the exact timeframe for this stabilization to happen, scientific findings urges immediate action since GHG levels do not readily stabilize owing to the long lifetime of these gases in the atmosphere.

Reduce sources + enhance sinks

The stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere can only be achieved through effective mitigation. Mitigation refers to the net decrease of GHGs released into the atmosphere, which can happen through a reduction of the GHG sources and/or the enhancement of their sinks.

Effective mitigation itself requires an appropriate inventory or accounting of the amount of GHGs regularly released to the atmosphere as well as a proper analysis of the available options for mitigation.

A GHG inventory accounts for emissions from the five basic sectors of energy, industry, land-use change and forestry, agriculture and waste.

Mitigation analysis considers the available technological, natural and financial resources, as well as the cost of the socio-economic and technological changes required by the different mitigation options.

The cost of mitigation may vary between sectors but the ancillary benefits of such changes, like the reduction of air pollution and the improvement of transportation, agriculture and waste management, should not be discounted.

Community- and household-based mitigation strategies should not be discounted either. A simplified GHG calculator can allow households to identify sources of emissions and create their own strategies to reduce emissions.

Mitigation measures and options

Possible source reduction measures can be found in the energy sector through renewables, energy efficiency and conservation, sustainable transport, and the like. Waste management practices designed to reduce the volume of waste also help lessen the amount of GHGs injected into the atmosphere.

Common sink enhancement measures are likely to be found in the agriculture and forestry sectors. Interventions in soil and livestock management, replenishing or preserving carbon stocks in forests can offset the release of GHGs into the atmosphere.